Where Does Trump’s Popularity Rank Among Incoming Presidents?

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In just a few short days, Donald Trump will become the nation’s 45th president. He’s preparing to take America’s reins with the lowest approval rating of any incoming president in at least the past four decades.

A new CNN/ORC poll reveals that just 40 percent of Americans approve of Trump. President Barack Obama took his first oath of office in 2009 with an 84 percent approval rating. CNN says:

Trump’s wobbly handling of the presidential transition has left most Americans with growing doubts that the President-elect will be able to handle the job. About 53 percent say Trump’s statements and actions since Election Day have made them less confident in his ability to handle the presidency, and the public is split evenly on whether Trump will be a good or poor president (48 percent on each side).

Similar results are mirrored in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll. The poll reveals that from 9 to 20 percent of Americans had unfavorable views of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton or Obama before they took office. About 36 percent of Americans viewed George W. Bush as unfavorable.

But a whopping 54 percent of U.S. residents don’t have good things to say about Trump.

Meanwhile, a recent Gallup poll found that when compared with Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Trump is the only president-elect who has an unfavorable rating that outweighs his favorable score. Trump also garnered fewer favorable ratings from his own party than his predecessors did.

Republican U.S. Rep. Sean Duffy, a Trump supporter from Wisconsin, tells CNN that Trump’s ongoing war of words with the media is taking its toll.

“What’s happening here is the public fight that Mr. Trump is having with CNN and other media groups has taken some skin off his poll numbers and it’s gone down,” Duffy explains.

Not surprisingly, Trump dismissed the polls, taking to Twitter to discount their results.

“The same people who did the phony election polls, and were so wrong, are now doing approval rating polls. They are rigged just like before.”

What do you think of Trump’s response to the polls? Sound off below or on Facebook.

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